Lent is a wonderful time to reflect on change. . .
Nearly 30 years ago, when I applied to be an ordained priest in my diocese, I was immediately sent to a place called, The Center for Ministry. The name has a nice ring to it, but basically, it’s a place designed to determine if there is anything between your two ears, and if there is something there, is it firing on all cylinders.
When a psychologist at the Center for Ministry finished his 12 hours of examination, he gave me a copy of my profile. I’d like to share a part of it to you:
Bill is of the personality type that usually exercises a continuous scanning of the external environment, and nothing out of the ordinary is likely to escape his attention. He enjoys the process of creating something–an idea or a project–but is more interested in moving on than he is in following through with the details of creation.
He is generally a keen and penetrating observer. He will always have a strong sense of the possible; what might be will always be more fascinating that what is.
I’m rather fond of summing it up this way: If you ask someone with my personality type if 2 + 2 = 4, we are liable to answer, Yes, but only in THIS universe.
In short, I was told that I like CHANGE! And that’s why you probably won’t find it surprising that only 5% of the total population fit into this personality type. And in the church where the mantra, That’s the way we’ve always done it, is repeated like a Buddhist chant, it’s sometimes hard to find even a fraction of that 5%.
My dear friends in Christ, all you need to do is look around our various jurisdictions and read a few National Church publications to see and know that the Church needs CHANGE! Congregations are dwindling, money is drying up, and pessimism is creeping in. The Holy Spirit is the divine ambassador of change. Pentecost was not about resting on your laurels. It was about burning the renewal of the Lord Jesus into your hearts.
Sigmund Freud once wrote, I have examined myself thoroughly and have come to the conclusion that I do not need to change much. God forbid that any of God’s baptized would ever look into the mirror and be able to even think such thoughts!
Now please believe me when I state that I don’t want to laud and magnify change for the sake of change, but this is the season of Lent. It’s a time of looking into the parched, deserted parts of our lives and to understand that even the best motivations need examination before God.
When it comes to evil tempting us in the desert of our lives, we are all susceptible. I really believe that one of the favorite sayings that ole Satan loves to whisper in our ears is, Keep looking because nothing’s written in stone. Sounds good on the surface, doesn’t it?
Nobody believes in innovation and openness more than I, but as an innovator and lover of change, I need Lent to come around for six weeks every year to remind me that the 10 Commandments were written in stone! Their value does not rest merely in their relevancy, but also in their universal truth. I believe it was commentator Ted Koppel who once said, The Ten Commandments are NOT multiple choice.
I need to remind myself this Lent that the commandments to love one another and to love even my enemies were written in hard wood, the hard wood of the cross.
How easy it is for me to say, God wouldn’t expect me to love that person, or You’d have to be God to love them. Well, maybe that’s what Jesus had in mind when he said, Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. The trick is learning how to accomplish this.
I’ve become rather fond of quoting the short stories of Jacob the Baker. Jacob was a simple man who owned the local bakery, but it turns out he was also a sage. Maybe his words can help us.
Two men approached the old baker, Jacob, and asked him to decide which of them was wise:
I know what is right, said the first man.
I know what is wrong, said the other.
Good, said Jacob. Together you make ONE wise man.
It’s a wonderful thing to see life as an exciting drama, pregnant with possibilities. Our creator God likes that attitude. But remember, because of our sinfulness, life can be pregnant with possibilities for both good and evil.
Remember our Gospel this week opens with the Pharisees coming to Jesus and saying, Get out of here, Herod wants to kill you.
I showed a video series once during our Lenten studies, and the speaker asked his audience. When was the last time you heard a sermon on ‘Original Sin?’ I was stunned when almost the entire congregation stopped eating their Lenten soup and turned around and looked at me.
Well, here it is! You know what I think original sin is? Original sin is the chronically human tendency to rely too heavily on data that confirms our own biases! I’m guilty, but am I alone in this?
Jesus weeps over Jerusalem in our Gospel this morning: Oh, how I longed to gather them under my arm like a mother hen gathers her young, but they would not! Why? because they were too busy marching to their own drum beat.
I saw a sign in a store the other day that read, WE DON’T MAKE CHANGE. That sign should never be worn by a Christian. Christians, like the prophets of old, need to be ready to speak for change. The radical change that will come with the radical and indiscriminate love of Jesus Christ.
But my friends in Christ, isn’t it true that we live in a world where principles are often at odds with preferences. Isn’t Wall Street on the receiving end of just a little bit of criticism because of that conflict? Isn’t it true that we live in a world where choosing rightly is often at odds with the right to choose?
I want to tell you that choice is not a value system. Choice is regulated by a value system. Choice is not a virtue. The bible doesn’t say, And now abides faith, hope, love and choice and the greatest of these is choice.
Choice is part of living, not the reason for living. Christians don’t live to choose. They live to love and to serve! Yet isn’t it true that the only politically correct culture is a choice culture?
Now don’t think I’m harking back to the good old days. I am always amazed at the arrogance of some who think that our day and time is the only point in history that needs the salvation of Jesus Christ. Original sin is called original because it’s been around since the origin of time. Look at our reading from Paul’s letter to the Philippians this week. You’ll find that Christ wasn’t the only one who wept for us. Paul writes:
Take note of those who live according to the pattern we gave you. For as I have often told you before and now say again even with tears. . . many of you live as enemies of the cross of Christ.
Those Philippians, you see, were twisting the message of a spirit-filled life into an excuse for licentiousness; they were focusing too heavily on data that confirmed their own biases! They became enemies of the cross because Christ-like love was no longer written in stone for them.
They failed to put the cross of Christ at the center of salvation, and they failed to put the death of Christ at the center of the cross. The cross is the greatest symbol of unconditional love ever given to humanity.
While the devil says, Keep looking, Jesus says, Keep looking up.
One of the ways that the church reminds us of the enduring and permanent love of God in Christ is through the words of our ancient Creed. Many of us will stand together this Sunday and with one voice proclaim our commitment to that love, and our commitment to the idea that such love is not a matter of choice. And just maybe one day Jesus will not have to weep over the New Jerusalem, the Church.
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